South32 cash rises despite share buyback, while production falls

Metal and mining company, South32 (ASX:S32) has announced its net cash rose by US$48 million to US$726 million in the March 2019 quarter, despite a further US$37 million being allotted to its share buy-back and increasing working capital.

Quarter on quarter production fell across most areas of the business, while payable lead production rose 10 per cent in the second quarter of 2019.

The BHP (ASX:BHP) spin off company dropped Alumina production guidance for FY19 in Worsley (Western Australian) by 4 per cent and dropped Brazil guidance by 5 per cent.

Meantime, the Perth based company saw record year-to-date ore production at Australia Manganese and increased its production guidance at both at its local and South African manganese operations for FY19, by 4 per cent each, on the back of favourable market conditions

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Jessica joined FNN in January 2017 after having worked in financial advising for seven years and in TV journalism for seven years, specialising in finance, equities and analysis. She has interviewed former Prime Ministers of Australia, Tony Abbott, Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd and ex Treasurer Jo Hockey. Jessica has worked as a journalist with Sky News Business, ABC 1, ABC's The Business, ABC24 and has also been a regional Channel 7 and 9 TV reporter with Prime7 and Win News.